Thinking of moving? Perhaps to a ski resort, a desert hideaway, warmer climes with lower taxes?
Better check the list below first, courtesy of a bit of numbers-crunching by the Kaiser Family Foundation. If you're concerned about how much you'll pay for health insurance, you may want to avoid the Top 10 most expensive places to purchase health insurance.
Before we get to the list, here's how Kaiser was able to identify these 10 locations:
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"The highest-cost regions were determined by the monthly premiums for a 40-year-old person. The list is based on rates listed on the federal and state insurance marketplaces and data compiled by Kaiser Family Foundation researchers," Kaiser reported.
It couldn't really pinpoint a reason why these locales were so expensive. Various factors played a role and, of course, there's just no way to explain away all the trends that are popping out in the health insurance world these days.
"The causes of the stratospheric premiums vary from region to region, although a recurring theme is that in some areas the limited number of hospitals and specialists allows them to demand high prices from insurers," Kaiser opined. "In Southwestern Georgia, one hospital system dominates the area and beat back an effort by federal anti-trust regulators to loosen its grip on the market.
"High individual insurance rates also reflect the extra costs that come when locals tend to be in poor health and where large numbers of people lack employer-sponsored insurance, leaving providers with more charity cases and lower-reimbursed Medicare patients."
Then again, Kaiser noted, folks that hang out in Vail and Aspen are generally thought to be fairly healthy. So it goes. Here's the list, ranked by the average silver plan premium.
- $483: Colorado Mountain Resort Region
- $461: Southwest Georgia
- $456: Rural Nevada
- $445: Far western Wisconsin
- $423: Southern Georgia
- $405: Most of Wyoming
- $399: Southeast Mississippi
- $395: Vermont
- $383: Fairfield, Conn.
- $381: Alaska
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Dan Cook
Dan Cook is a journalist and communications consultant based in Portland, OR. During his journalism career he has been a reporter and editor for a variety of media companies, including American Lawyer Media, BusinessWeek, Newhouse Newspapers, Knight-Ridder, Time Inc., and Reuters. He specializes in health care and insurance related coverage for BenefitsPRO.
